One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest @ Classic Theater Guild, 2/17/12

by Michael Eck
“One flew east, one flew west, one flew over the cuckoo’s nest.”
It’s a nursery rhyme that ends in disaster for Randle Patrick McMurphy.
Classic Theatre Guild is revisiting Dale Wasserman’s dramatic adaptation of Ken Kesey’s inimitable “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest” with a production that runs through Feb. 26 at Proctors’ Fenimore Gallery.
CTG staged the play in 2007, and this marks the first time the troupe has revived one of its own productions.
“Cuckoo’s Nest,” of course, hinges on McMurphy, a violent, swaggering loudmouth who has basically talked his way into the nuthouse, only to find it’s harder to get out than he realized.
Nurse Ratched, who runs the ward, is the play’s antagonist and rarely has the term fit the role better.
She and McMurphy battle throughout the play, while other inhabitants of the hospital orbit around them.
Daniel Martin, who has played many roles for CTG, is McMurphy, and it’s the best work he’s done — topping even his recent role as John Proctor.
Martin, physically, is tall and imposing and it works towards making McMurphy intimidating. Actors, caught up in the charisma of the character, sometimes forget that McMurphy is not a likable guy. Martin doesn’t. There’s a dark gleam running through the entire portrayal.
Rie Lee returns from the 2007 cast to again play Ratched, but she’s a bit too soft. Ratched is a demon, but Lee doesn’t push her that far. She is not a match for Martin’s anger and it makes the play feel slightly stilted.
When McMurphy finally takes her down it doesn’t feel righteous so much as just raging.
Anyone familiar with the tale — from the book, the play or the film — knows that while McMurphy and Ratched are the sparring stars, Chief Bromden is the true heart.
In Michael Lake’s portrayal in Schenectady, he is just that.
Lake is excellent in the role, bringing the right kind of heavy-lidded but quiet intensity.
His scenes alone with McMurphy, sharing sticks of gum and long-kept secrets, are the play’s — and this production’s — best.
Lake makes the final moments touching, as they should be.
The rest of director Amanda Stankavich’s ensemble cast is a motley mix of talent, often the case with CTG as other local theaters.
George Filieau stands out as the voluntarily-institutionalized oddball Dale Harding.
On Friday, however, Filieau had to fight with elements of a stage set that was almost falling apart. That set — designed by Herb Newsome — was inspired by David Caso’s original. The similarly rickety sound design, from Stankavich and John Nickles, was inspired by Jim Keil’s 2007 work.
Luckily, Martin’s portrayal is sturdier than either.